 In the 1970s, J. Desmond Clark of the University of California excavated a Paleolithic site in this woreda, located on the upper reaches of the Shabelle River.The 2007 national census reported a total population for this woreda of 186,907, of whom 92,471 were men and 94,436 were women; 20,667 or 11.06% of its population were urban dwellers.The majority of the inhabitants were Muslim, with 80.68% of the population reporting they observed this belief, while 17.89% of the population said they practiced Ethiopian Orthodox Christianity, and 1.31% of the population were Protestant.